Tag Archives: Os Lusíadas

Warship Wednesday, Oct 16, 2019: The Everlasting VDG

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1946 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places. – Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, Oct 16, 2019: The Everlasting VDG

“Photo by Simmonds, Portsmouth,” USN NH 94220

Here we see the coastal defense “battleship” (cruzador-couraçado) Vasco da Gama of the Royal Portuguese Navy, June 1895, at the opening of the Kiel Canal, with a German Sachsen-class pre-dreadnought to the right. Da Gama is the only unit of the Portuguese Navy to be described as a capital ship and she outlasted most of her contemporaries, remaining the most powerful vessel in Lisbon’s fleet for six decades.

While Portugal’s naval needs were primarily colonial in the late 19th Century, which was satisfied by a series of lightly armed frigates and sloops, something more regal was needed for sitting around the capital and spending time showing the flag in European ports. Enter VDG, the third such Portuguese naval ship named for the famous explorer, with the two previous vessels being 18th and 19th-century ships-of-war of 70- and 80-guns, respectively.

Built originally as a central battery casemate ironclad with a barquentine rig by Thames Iron Works, Blackwall, this English-designed warship first hit the waves in 1876– just over a decade removed from the Monitor and Merrimack. Originally mounting a pair of Krupp-made 10.35-inch (26cm RKL/20 C/74) black powder breechloader guns in a central raised battery, the 200-foot steamer carried a whopping 9 to 10 inches of iron plate in her side belt and shields. Her steam plant allowed a 10-knot speed, which was adequate for the era.

1888 Brassey’s layout via Wiki commons

Her 10.35-inch Krupp breechloaders, which could be oriented inside her gun house to fire through four different gun ports forward/aft and port/sbd via turntables and tracks. Image is an 1880 print published in the magazine, “O Occidente”

She was a nice-looking ship for her time and often appeared on goodwill voyages around the Med and even into the Baltic.

Portuguese hermaphrodite ironclad Vasco da Gama, with her canvas aloft, Illustrated London News, July 15, 1876

Couraçado Vasco da Gama, in a print published in the magazine “O Occidente” in 1880

This included being one of the 165 vessels present among the 30 miles of wood, iron, and steel for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee Spithead fleet review in 1897. VDG was in good company as the Royal Navy had on hand “53 iron-clads and armoured cruisers, 21 more than the nearest rival, France.”

Vasco da Gama, 1897 Spithead review, from a handout of the event published by The Graphic, which said “”Portugal sent the Vasco da Gama (Captain Bareto de Vascomellos), a small battleship of 2,479 tons, built at Blackwall in 1875. she is armed with two 10.2-inch guns and seven smaller guns.”

The Naval Review at Spithead, 26 June 1897, by Eduardo de Martino via the Royal Collection Trust, RCIN 405260

In the mid-1890s, five modern warships– largely paid for by public subscription– were ordered to give VDG some backup. These ships, all smallish cruisers with long legs for colonial service, included the Rainha Dona Amélia (1683-tons, 4×6-inch guns, built domestically), Dom Carlos I (4250-tons, 4×6-inch, ordered from Armstrong Elswick), São Gabriel and São Rafael (1771-tons, 2×6-inch guns, ordered from Normand Le Havre), and Warship Wednesday alum, Adamastor.

In 1902, with the newer ships on hand, VDG was taken offline and sent to Italy to Orlando where she was completely rebuilt in a move that saw her cut in half and lengthened by 32-feet, fitted with new engines, guns, and machinery. The effect was that, in a decade, Portugal had gone from one elderly ironclad to six relatively effective, if light, cruisers of which VDG was still the largest and remained the flagship of the Navy.

She emerged looking very different, having landed her sail rig, picked up a second stack, and been rearmed with a pair of 8″/39.9cal Pattern P EOC-made naval guns in sponsons. She even had her iron armor replaced by new Terni steel plate. Basically a new ship, her speed had increased and she was capable of 6,000 nm sorties, which enabled her to voyage to Africa in service of the crown, if needed.

Nave da battaglia Vasco Da Gama 1903 (AS Livorno, Archivio storico del Cantiere navale Luigi Orlando)

Navios da Marinha de Guerra Portugueza no alto mar 1903 by Alfredo Roque Gamerio, showing ‘cruzadors” Vasco da Gama, Don Carlos I, S Rafael, Amelia and Adamastor to the far right. Note the black hulls and buff stacks

It was envisioned that VGD would be replaced by two planned 20,000-ton modern battleships (!) on the eve of the Great War, however, that balloon never got enough air to get off the ground due to Portugal’s bankrupt state treasury. Therefore, she soldiered on.

Her 1914 Jane’s Listing.

It was after her refit that she saw a period of action, being involved in assorted revolutions and coup attempts in 1910, 1913 and, along with other Portuguese Navy vessels, in 1915 that included bombarding Lisbon and sending revolting sailors ashore.

Portuguese Bluejackets escorting a Royalist prisoner in Lisbon, Portugal, October 6, 1910. George C. Bain Collection

Vasco da Gama’s crew in the “Revolta de 14 de Maio de 1915” in Portugal

Nonetheless, during World War I, although Portugal was not involved in the fighting in Europe in the early days of the conflict, VDG escorted troop reinforcements to Portugal’s African colonies in Mozambique and Angola, where the country was allied with British and French efforts to rid the continent of German influence.

In February 1916, her crews helped seize 36 German and Austro-Hungarian ships holed up in Lisbon on the eve of Berlin’s declaration of war on the Iberian country. Once that occurred, she served in coastal defense roles, dodging some very active German U-boats in the process.

VASCO DA GAMA Portuguese Battleship 1915-20, probably at Lisbon, note the Douro class destroyer, NH 93621

Via Ilustracao Portuguesa: Commander Leote do Rego and the French naval attaché on Vasco da Gama 1916, posing with a deck gun which looks to be her 6″/45cal EOC

Once her only shooting war had ended without her actually firing a shot in anger, VGD still served as a ship of state and carried the commanding admiral’s flag.

Via Ilustracao Portuguesa Vasco da Gama tour by Spanish King Alfonso XIII 1922

Finally, in 1935, she was retired and scrapped along with the other five 19th century cruisers than remained. These vessels were all replaced en mass by a shipbuilding program that saw 5 Vouga-class destroyers ordered from Vickers along with a trio of small submarines and six sloops. This replacement fleet would serve the country’s seagoing needs well into the 1960s.

While her hull was broken, VDG’s 1902-era British-made guns were removed and reinstalled in 1936 in a series of coastal defense batteries at Monte da Guia, Espalamaca, Horta Bay and Faial Island in the strategically-located Azores, which remained active through WWII, and then kept ready as a wartime reserve until at least 1970. Some of those emplacements are still relatively preserved.

Further, Vasco da Gama is remembered by maritime art.

Cruzador Couraçado Vasco da Gama. Aguarela de Fernando Lemos Gomes. Museu de Marinha RM2572-492

An excellent scale model of her, as originally built, exists in the Maritime Museum, in Lisbon.

Portuguese ironclad Vasco da Gama (1876), Maritime Museum, Lisbon.

Her name was reissued to a British Bay-class frigate, ex-HMS Mounts Bay, in 1961 which went on to serve as F478 into the 1970s and then to a MEKO 200 type frigate (F330) commissioned in 1991.

Specs:
(As built)
Displacement:2,384 t (2,346 long tons; 2,628 short tons)
Length: 200 ft pp
Beam: 40 ft
Draft: 19 ft
Installed power: 3,000 ihp
Sail plan: Barquentine rig
Speed: 10.3 knots
Complement: 232 men
Armor:
Belt: 9 in (230 mm), iron plate
Battery: 10 in (250 mm)
Armament:
2 × Krupp 10.35″/18cal 26cm RKL/20 C/74
1 × Krupp 15cm RKL/25 C/75
4 × 9-pounder guns
(1914)
Displacement: 3200 tons, full load
Length: 234 ft.
Beam: 40 ft
Draft: 18 ft
Installed power: 2 VTE, Yarrow water tube boilers, 6,000 ihp
Speed: 15 knots
Range: 6,000nm on 468 tons coal
Complement: 260 men
Armor: Terni steel; belt: 250 – 100mm, deck: 75mm, shields: 200mm
Armament:
2 x EOC 8″/39.9 Pattern P guns
1 x EOC 6″/45
1 x QF 12-pounder 12-cwt gun (76mm)
8 x QF 3-pounder Hotchkiss 57mm guns

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO), Publishers of Warship International

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The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

With more than 50 years of scholarship, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

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Warship Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2019: Manuel’s least favorite cruiser

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Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2019: Manuel’s least favorite cruiser

Université de Caen Basse-Normandie from Caen, France (15225939616)

Here we see the unique third-class protected cruiser Adamastor of the (sometimes Royal) Portuguese Navy. A tiny ship for her type, she put in a lot of unsung service over a four-decade career.

While Portugal had one of the world’s best navies in the days of Afonso de Albuquerque and Vasco De Gama, by the late 1890s, the empire was in steep decline. With only about 300 merchant ships carrying the country’s flag– mostly sailing vessels– Portugal did not have a big civilian fleet to protect. What Lisbon did have were lots of overseas possessions such as the Cape Verde Islands in the Atlantic, African colonies in Guinea, Angola, and Portuguese East Africa (Mozambique); Goa in the Indian Ocean, Timor in the East Indies, and the Chinese enclave of Macau.

To protect this far-flung collection of pearls, Portugal had only several wooden-hulled vessels and the 3,300-ton British-built ironclad Vasco Da Gama (go figure), which was built in the 1870s.

In the mid-1890s, five modern warships– largely paid for by public subscription– were ordered to give VDG some backup. These ships, all smallish cruisers with long legs, included the Rainha Dona Amélia (1683-tons, 4×6-inch guns, built domestically), Dom Carlos I (4250-tons, 4×6-inch, ordered from Armstrong Elswick), São Gabriel and São Rafael (1771-tons, 2×6-inch guns, ordered from Normand Le Havre), and our subject, Adamastor. In 1902, even the old VDG was taken to Orlando and completely rebuilt in a move that saw her cut in half and lengthened by 32-feet, fitted with new engines, guns, and machinery. The effect was that, in a decade, Portugal had gone from one elderly ironclad to six relatively effective, if light, cruisers.

“Navios da Marinha de Guerra Portugueza no alto “Mar 1903 by Alfredo Roque Gamerio, showing the revamped fleet with the “cruzadors” Vasco da Gama, Don Carlos I, São Rafael, Amelia and Adamastor to the far right. Note the black hulls and buff stacks/masts. The fact that these ships were all ordered from British, French, and Italian yards at the same time had to have made for some awkward fleet operations, not to mention logistics and training issues.

The name Adamastor is unique to Portugal and is drawn from a mythical water giant created by Portuguese poet Luís de Camões– Portugal’s Shakespeare– in his epic poem Os Lusíadas as a symbol of the forces of nature encountered by navigators on the high seas. Specifically, “Adamastor” was the name of the giant that supposedly guarded the Cape of Good Hope. A beast that was defeated by the explorer Vasco da Gama.

This guy:

The cruiser Adamastor’s figurehead, now in the Portuguese naval museum, the Museu de Marinha.

Ordered from Orlando, Livorno, Italy in 1895, Adamastor was commissioned just two years later and joined the fleet.

Cerimónia de lançamento à água do cruzador Adamastor, em Livorno, Itália, 12/07/1896

O cruzador Adamastor, em Livorno, 1897, in all of her pristine newness.

The arrival of the Portuguese unprotected cruiser Adamastor at Lisbon

At just 1,700-tons, the 235-foot long “cruiser” carried a pair of 6-inch (150mm) Krupp guns in single mounts fore and aft as well as four 4.7-inch (105mm) Krupp secondaries in broadside. Two 37mm Hotchkiss 6-pdrs were on the bridge wing while a pair of Nordenfeldt 6.5mm machine guns were in the fighting top. Her most formidable weapons were likely the three torpedo tubes for Whitehead pattern fish she carried on deck.

Sailors of the cruiser Adamastor, in maneuvering exercise, in 1905 by one of the ship’s 4.7-inch guns. Note their uniforms and landing force gear. Via Museum de Marinha.

Her armor? Just 30mm on the deck over her machinery and 65mm on the sides of the conning tower, as noted by Ivan Gogin, who characterized Adamastor as “Actually large gunboat with armored deck.”

She was divided into 23 watertight compartments and was electrically lit by 190 lamps.

Capable of 18-knots, she was fast for a gunboat, slow for a cruiser, but could make an impressive 8,896 nm at 10 knots on 419 tons of coal, which gave her enough range for colonial service, her intended tasking.

Speaking of which, the 1898 edition of The Engineer has an excellent write-up on her machinery.

Adamastor engines and boilers via The Engineer 1898

Adamastor profile via Scientific American Vol 45

Between joining the fleet in 1898 and the mid-1930s, Adamastor spent most of her time in the Pacific, hanging out in Macau, rotating back to Europe for refits every few years with stopovers at other Portuguese colonies (former and current) along the way. Of note, she reportedly fought pirates in the region of both the Rif off Morocco and the East Indies.

Portuguese unprotected cruiser Adamastor in Rio during the inauguration of Brazilian President Campos Salles Nov 15 1898

Adamastor of the Royal Portuguese Navy on the Tejo River, 1904

Cruzador Adamastor fundeado em Hong Kong, 1905. Via Museu de Marinha. Note her now black hull, 6-inch Krupp mount forward, and the carved figurehead. She carried six boats.

In Angola

At Shangai, 5/10/1927 dressed for the occasion, now back to a white hull, which was undoubtedly welcome in the Far East. Via Museu de Marinha

Cruiser Adamastor, was badly damaged after hitting a rock in Hong Kong’s Dumbell harbor. May 13, 1913.

When the centuries-old Portuguese monarchy was overthrown in 1910 and the country became a republic, most of the Portuguese fleet was renamed– for instance, Rainha Dona Amélia became Republica and Dom Carlos I became Almirante Reis— while Adamastor was able to keep her moniker. Everyone likes sea giants, right?

A better explanation was that during the revolution, while at anchor in the Tagus, she hoisted the red and green flag of the Republicans and bombarded Necessidades Palace with three shells, sending King Manuel II to exile. In short, she was the cruiser Aurora of the Portuguese Revolution.

Portuguese Bluejackets escorting a Royalist prisoner in Lisbon, Portugal, October 6, 1910. George C. Bain Collection

Further, it should be noted that, while Aurora was alone in the Neva in 1917, Adamastor had most of the fleet anchored next to her, including ships still loyal to the Royalist government, which meant she was taking a big risk in what was effectively a mutiny.

Our cruiser getting her shots in at the palace. Published in “Illustração Portugueza, nº 243, de 17 de Outubro de 1910.” Via Museu Marinha LG184

The 1910 republican flag flown from Adamastor (Bandeira içada a bordo do “Adamastor” na noite de 3 para 4 de Outubro de 1910.) Now in the naval museum.

In 1913, while poking around the Far East, she went aground at Dumbell Island, and the British C-class destroyer HMS Otter came to her assistance. A gregarious naval officer by the name of João de Canto e Castro, who was later to become the 5th President of the Republic in 1918, was appointed Adamastor‘s skipper after the incident.

When the Great War came, Adamastor found herself in Mozambique and in May 1916 supported a force of 400 Portuguese colonial soldiers in an ill-fated attempt to cross north of the Rovuma River into German East Africa. Lettow-Vorbeck got the better end of that deal.

In 1933, after providing a lot of solid service, the well-traveled Adamastor was sold for her value in scrap.

ADAMASTOR Portuguese Cruiser, At Hankow, China, circa 1931-33, late in her career. Note the extensive awnings. Collection of Lieutenant Oscar W. Levy, USN SC ret. NH 94176

For what’s its worth, she by far outlived the other four cruisers ordered alongside her: São Rafael wrecked in 1911, while São Gabriel, Dom Carlos I/Almirante Reis, and Rainha Dona Amélia/República were scrapped in 1924.

The Museu de Marinha in Belém near Lisbon has an excellent model of Adamastor on display, as well as other artifacts already discussed.

The Spanish government issued a series of naval postage stamps that included our subject.

And she is, of course, remembered through maritime art as well.

Portuguese unprotected cruiser Adamastor at the Cape of Good Hope– a great play on the ship’s name

Cruiser Adamastor watercolor on paper issued on the centenaries of Vasco da Gama and Luís de Camões by artist P. Cazenave and dated 1897

Specs:

From the 1914 Janes Fighting Ships

If you liked this column, please consider joining the International Naval Research Organization (INRO), Publishers of Warship International

They are possibly one of the best sources of naval study, images, and fellowship you can find. http://www.warship.org/membership.htm

The International Naval Research Organization is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the encouragement of the study of naval vessels and their histories, principally in the era of iron and steel warships (about 1860 to date). Its purpose is to provide information and a means of contact for those interested in warships.

With more than 50 years of scholarship, Warship International, the written tome of the INRO has published hundreds of articles, most of which are unique in their sweep and subject.

PRINT still has its place. If you LOVE warships you should belong.

I’m a member, so should you be!